LAHORE, Jan 2: The University of Health Sciences (UHS) will try to keep BSc (Honours) courses in allied health sciences running in its affiliated institutes despite the non-availability of funds.

This was resolved in a meeting of the academic committee of UHS board of governors held here on Wednesday.

The meeting was attended by committee convener Prof Malik Husain Mubbashar, Prof Amir Aziz, UHS Vice-Chancellor Prof IA Naveed and Registrar Dr Asad Zaheer.

Prof Naveed said the university had launched 18 BSc (Honours) courses in allied health sciences in 2007 in its 18 affiliated colleges to meet the shortage of manpower for essential functions of laboratory diagnosis, radio-diagnosis and rehabilitation of patients.

The courses included four-year BSc (Honours) in Medical Imaging Technology, Medical Lab Technology, Physiotherapy, Optometry, Emergency and Intensive Care, Dental Technology, Cardiac Perfusion, Biomedical Engineering, Speech and Language Therapy, Respiratory Therapy, Occupation Therapy, Dental Hygiene, Nutrition, Audiology, Operation Theatre Assistant and Ophthalmic Medicine.

The committee learnt that the government approved Rs40 million for a project called ‘Strengthening the Training Facilities for Allied Health Sciences Courses for the UHS Affiliated Colleges’ but funds were not released.

The VC added despite non-availability of funds, most of the colleges managed to run these courses.

The committee learnt that currently these courses were being offered in 21 public and private institutes, of them the Nishtar Medical College of Multan, the Quaid-i-Azam Medical College of Bahawalpur and the Services Institute of Medical Sciences of Lahore had stopped these courses whereas the Punjab Medical College of Faisalabad and de’Montmorency College of Dentistry of Lahore had not even started these course.

UHS Registrar Dr Asad Zaheer told the committee that the Punjab government had recently approved a service structure for allied health sciences’ personnel.

The committee asked the VC to direct all colleges to continue running BSc courses under a rationalised fee structure.